Prior to beginning work on this discussion, read Chapter 9 in your textbook, the required articles, Why the Opioid Epidemic May Have Fueled America’s Murder Spike (Links to an external site.) and Opioid Epidemic So Dangerous, Says CDC, It’s Finally Killing More People Than Guns (Links to an external site.), and watch the video: Warning: This Drug May Kill You (Links to an external site.). The opioid crisis has become a controversial issue but one that is becoming harder and harder to ignore. In the context of the relationship between psychology and criminal behavior, substance abuse is one of the leading risk factors for criminal behavior. Therefore, the opioid crisis is an issue that criminal psychologists, public health professionals, and our community-at-large are examining the implications, the most crucial of which appears to be a relationship between homicide/violent crime rates and opioid abuse. In your discussion,

Conduct additional research on the opioid crisis using the University of Arizona Global Campus to ensure you are aware of the latest issues in the opioid crisis national debate. Then, briefly debate the issue with your classmates. Your instructor will assign you to one of the two prompts. Please debate the issue from the perspective that:

• Prompt 1: Physicians have caused the opioid crisis by over-prescribing pain medications that are highly addictive, and
• Prompt 2: From the perspective that the person taking the opiates is responsible for the person’s own behavior and doctors should be able to prescribe whatever they want in any quantity they deem medically necessary. Remember to provide your insight into whether rising violent crime rates stems from the opioid crisis as asserted in your assigned readings.